Knevet, Ralph. A Supplement of the Faery Queene. Edited by Christopher Burlinson and Andrew Zurcher. Manchester UP (The Manchester Spenser), 2015. viii + 349 pp. ISBN: 978-0719082597. $109.00 cloth.

Ralph Knevet (c.1601/2-1671) is one of the most neglected of Spenser’s seventeenth-century followers and imitators (which is perhaps saying something). Knevet is an under-rated lyric poet who has a decent line in metaphysical wit, as the following example, clearly influenced by Donne and Herbert, demonstrates:

If I could weepe my self into a spring, 
            Or a perpetuall current: then 
This Metamorphosis might seeme a thing 
            Of merit, in the eyes of Men: 
            But what requitall can this bee, 
            To him, that did weepe blood for me?

Could I for penitentiall sigheings, vye 
            With the whole compasse, some might guesse, 
That my contrition was a motive high, 
            To melt an heart, even mercyles. 
            But what requitall can this bee, 
            To him that sigh’d his last for mee?

What if I should to death my self expose? 
            And feele a torture in each nerve: 
Yet all these torments in one death must close, 
            And what by it could I deserve 
            From him, who dyeing once, did mee 
            From millions of deaths sett free?

Lord since by acte I can effect no good, 
            Nor yet by suffreing, lend Thou mee, 
The flowers of thy Passion, strip’d with blood, 
            Which I will render unto Thee, 
            Dew’d with my teares, hopeing by these, 
            (Though not to merite) yet t’appease.[1]

The religious sensibility suggests an intense and sustained reaction to doctrines of predestination—if I could, I would (implying that I don’t believe I can), but I have to try whatever happens—which is not the same as concluding that Knevet was obviously Calvinist. Such poems recall Donne’s Holy Sonnets as well as works such as “Affliction (IV),” with its terrifying line, “My thoughts are all a case of knives.” As that poem compares religious suffering to torture, so does Knevet in asking whether he should seek martyrdom for his faith (which links the poem to the pseudo-martyr debate, a further indication that Knevet was eager to write in the shadow of Donne). The opening lines are a neat play on Ovidian transformation with the poet desiring the oblivion of becoming an inanimate natural phenomenon (is there a connection worth making to Marvell’s “The Garden”?). The speaker articulates a desperate hopelessness that whatever he does, however great the pain he experiences, he can never prove himself worthy of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross. Instead the poet will have to make do with borrowing the passion flower, its petals thought to represent Christ’s agony on the cross, which he will use to remind him of the lord’s suffering and sacrifice for him, and offer back to God as an inadequate token of his devotion.

Knevet poses a dilemma for readers. He is clearly a fine, skilful poet who repays attention. But is he too derivative to warrant serious interest? His lyrics have been available for years but he has always been a relatively obscure writer, little known even to serious scholars of seventeenth-century poetry. Is he just too much of a sensible and reasonable poet to demand attention, paying his dues to his forebears in a respectful manner that deserves admiration but is unlikely to inspire interest from readers? As the editors point out in their introduction, Knevet’s poetry is heavily indebted to the commonplace book, and can be densely packed with useful references, which can limit argument, and put off a reader not already convinced of the work’s value (3). It is an indication of his non-reputation that Knevet does not appear in Dame Helen Gardner’s canonical defining anthology, The Metaphysical Poets (1957), nor in Colin Burrow’s revised edition (2006).[2]

Knevet will be known to Spenserians for his lengthy Supplement of The Faery Queene, which survives in a unique copy in Cambridge University Library. But this work, even more than his lyric poetry, has not excited a great deal of interest and the pioneering works that exist have not precipitated further research. Knevet has no entry in The Spenser Encyclopedia; does not appear in Michelle O’Callaghan’s excellent study of Jacobean Spenserians, The “Shepheardes Nation” (2000) (he is a bit late); and is not included in William B. Hunter, Jr.’s anthology The English Spenserians (1977).[3] David Radcliffe Hill’s reception history of Spenser (1996) refers to Knevet only in the bibliography, where an article by C. Millican Bowie from 1938 and a dissertation edition from 1958 are mentioned.[4]

Spenserians should, therefore, be extraordinarily grateful to Christopher Burlinson and Andrew Zurcher, two dedicated first-rate editors, who have now produced a proper annotated edition of Knevet’s poem; to their series editor, Julian Lethbridge; and to Manchester University Press, for producing an impressive and usable edition of the poem, at a time when so many publishers are being cautious (all readers of this review—order a copy for your university library now, or poor Knevet will never get his dues!). There is now no excuse for neglecting this important poem (I am not writing from a position of moral authority: despite knowing about Knevet for many years and having called up the manuscript in the library more than once, I had not read it until asked to review the volume).

Knevet’s life is obscure. After attending Peterhouse College, Cambridge, he seems to have lived in his native East Anglia, his reasonably well-to-do and well-connected family linking him to the other influential families in the region—in particular the Pastons, for whom he probably worked in some form of ecclesiastical capacity. He took holy orders at an advanced age, in 1652, and became rector of Lyng, about fifteen miles north-west of Norwich (where he had a play performed in 1631), dying there in 1671. He wrote a number of works: collections of devotional poetry, and a huge work on military discipline urging “English readers to unite in a common, national resolve to repel a feared attack from Catholic Europe” (1), as well as the Supplement, which he dates to 1635.

The Supplement is an impressive but odd poem. It is not the work of a strong poet—in Harold Bloom’s terms—deliberately misreading the work of the master to produce a startlingly new original work. Knevet is not Milton, nor is he Blake. Rather, he follows the structure, style, and stanza of The Faerie Queene in homage to the master, and the Supplement is peppered with familiar Spenserian motifs: knightly combat, vulnerable and naughty ladies, gaudy palaces, changelings, giants, lush gardens, and so on. In doing so he simplifies, as the editors point out. While Spenser has four of his six books based on a quest structure with a knight errant riding out on a quest, and two far more Ariostan books, featuring “a complex and virtuosic deployment of narrative entrelacement,” Knevet sticks to the knightly quest model, in which the protagonist’s “serial adventures illustrate philosophical and historical aspects of the virtue relevant to the book” (11-2). Knevet adds three books with twelve cantos, outlining the legend of Albanio, the Knight of Prudence (Book 7); the legend of Callimachus, the knight of Fortitude (Book 8); and the legend of Sir Belcoeur, the knight of liberality. Even with Knevet’s efforts we do not get to the twelve (or twenty-four) books promised in the “Letter to Raleigh.” The Supplement ends with what looks like a more firm and definite revisiting of the conclusion to Spenser’s Book 6, but with no possibility of a cycle endlessly repeating itself as the beast returns to wreak havoc once again. Sir Belcoeur frees Eleutheria from Chrysagyr, and destroys his horrible, idolatrous temple in what reads like a true finale:

            But Belcoeur, did that Idol huge o’rethrow,

            Which had bin worship’d so religiously,

            Hee caus’d those lofty okes to bee layd low,

            (That whilome sheltred such idolatry)

            And those foule rites abolish’d vtterly,

            Then hee with Eleutheria did repayre,

            To the Vtopian country ioyfully,

            Where for his paines, he reap’d a guerdon faire,

            For both her bed shee gaue him, and her regall chayre.

(9.12.47)

The stanza rewrites the endings to both editions of The Faerie Queene, having the lovers properly united (unlike the aftermath to the destruction of the House of Busyrane), and the idolatrous temple destroyed instead of the monasteries as they were at the end of Book 6. We are reminded that this is a fantasy, one that the readers of the poem can help to create if they act properly, because at present the story exists only in the realm of Utopia. Here the lovers are properly united as romance heroes and heroines should be, and God’s in his heaven and all is right with the world.

The stanza represents Knevet’s virtues and vices. He is a clever poet of wide range and serious ambition who thinks through problems that he can solve in his chosen mode of writing. But what he does always risks being derivative, taking its cue from existing writing. Knevet never has the adept, complicating mode of Spenser, and the Supplement tends to reduce The Faerie Queene to its constituent elements rather than putting them all together. Knevet is good at moral, historical, and topical allegory but he never really manages to synthesize these types of writing, and leaves us with an allegorical form that provides us with satisfying answers not unsettling challenges. There is none of the debate through and across books and the three new virtues do indeed supplement Spenser’s poem: or, perhaps we should acknowledge, what many think Spenser’s poem to have been. This is not to denigrate Knevet so much as to acknowledge how major a poet Spenser was, and how often he was imitated and how rarely understood. To cite the editors again, “Where Spenser’s allegory feels rich and unstable, Knevet’s tends towards historical specificity and order” (21). Spenser has become Bunyan (or perhaps we should be careful and qualify this judgement: what Bunyan is assumed to be).

The straightforward distinction between good and evil is emphasized through lines which are generally end-stopped. Take this example of the pointed contrast between the false Malfida and the generously triumphant Albanio:

                        When false Malfida saw her Knights thus foyl’d,

                        Shee gaue the reyne vnto her nimble steed,

                        And into the adioyneing wood recoyl’d

                        With shame, and indignation ill bested,

                        But our good Knight nor follow’d when she fled,

                        Nor stayd, to take full vengeance of his foes,

                        That without cause had sought his bloud to shed:

                        His clemencye his passion ouerflowes,

                        And hee in peace on his intended iorney goes.

(7.1.7)

The decision to be merciful to his foes is not a decision the knight is likely to regret and he is both mighty enough to defeat them and sensible enough not to put the boot in for no reason. There is no real poetic pressure on the concluding alexandrine or suggestion that this line might undercut the apparent meaning of the previous eight, warning the reader to be wary that things are not what they seem to be. Prudence, as we learn in the canto, is a secure virtue that should be followed without reservation:

                        But sacred Prudence neuer looks awry,

                        Light-footed Time (that doth his brats deuoure,

                        Beneath whose sharp-fang’d sickle all things lye)

                        Against high wisdom hath no strength or power:

                        Hee that beside her all things doth deflowre,

                        Still addes vnto her beauty, and augments

                        Her worth, yeares make her not to stoup or lowre;

                        For strength, and vigour age to her presents:

                        Yeares make her younger, and increase her excellence.

(7.2.2)

Again, the single end-stopped line draws attention to the measured and controlled nature of the verse and the habitual coincidence between line and sense. The description has a certain power and panache: consider the image of Time which amalgamates Chronos (the child-eating parent) with Uranus (the sickle-wielding god), which also, as Burlinson and Zurcher aptly note, glances back to the end of The Mutabilitie Cantos (231). Even so, the contrast between the decay wrought by time and the contrary increase in the value of prudence is not one replete with nuance, even as it recalls Herbert’s “Virtue.”

Knevet is at his most straightforward when he is providing more direct religious allegory. Such descriptions often possess great power and are invariably enjoyable to read. The Temple of Plautus, with its horrible, gaudy idols, witnesses the offerings of various related vices: Rapine, Usury, and Simony among them. It is prudently destroyed by Albanio, who knows that here, he should not reign in his righteous wrath. A subsequent earthquake demolishes the temple and in its place appears the “famous Heptarchy of Colledges” (7.4.21.3), and where once were “stinking fennes, that earst bred sauours ill” (7.4.22.1), fair gardens spring up. Knevet would seem to have drainage schemes in Norfolk in mind and his celebration of nature possess a poetic grace:

                        The spotted Nauel-wort, and Spiderwort,

                        Blew Moone-wort couered by the Alpine snow,

                        Orchis, whose roote incites to lustfull sport,

                        Cephalicke Beares eares, and the Primrose low,

                        Cowslips which serue poor cottages to strowe,

                        Coole Borage, and the Red Rose Campion,

                        The purple Toade-flaxe, that makes vrine flow,

                        Stocke Gilliflowres prais’d for their hue alone,

                        And Columbines here grew, so good against the stone.

(7.4.27)

There’s no obvious bathos here in the description of the beneficial healing effects of the flowers, and Knevet is probably one of a very small number of poets who can make the words “vrine flow” sound even vaguely poetic, but an acknowledgement that a garden that could be seen outside English rural dwellings had both practical and aesthetic purposes. Poets need to be able to make lists interesting and Knevet is probably as good at this aspect of poetic craft as Spenser. However, he may be wrong about some plants:

                        Tabacco seem’d here to lament her case,

                        Clad in a weed of dusky greene, for shee

                        Is prostituted to each Peasant base,

                        Who fouly doe abuse wee daily see,

                        Those wholesome vertues that in this herbe bee[.]

(7.4.33.1-5)

At times Knevet simply imitates Spenser, as in his description of the River Albis which was once “cleere”: “(but now / All horrid with deepe markes of humane gore / Hee creepes along with pace and leisure slow)” (9.1.46.1-3). The reference is clearly to the “baleful Oure” stained with English blood (4.9.44). Knevet includes this description as part of his sustained allegory of the dangers of the Thirty Years War, updating Spenser’s anxiety about the spread of violence during the Anglo-Spanish War. Knevet was knowledgeable about the progress of the war, which is still an under-researched subject in the study of seventeenth-century English writing, another reason why the Supplement is such an interesting and valuable poem. Knevet continues Spenser’s concern for the potentially destructive conflict between military and civil authorities and, in representing Gustavus Adolphus as a true Protestant hero, he is commenting on the lamentable failure of the incumbent English monarch, Charles I, and what Knevet saw as his foolish toleration for Catholicism.

Like Milton lamenting the failure of the “good old cause” after the Restoration, Knevet argues that many peoples are not really deserving of liberty. In Book 9, Sir Belcoeur frees Liberta from the evil giant, Maltorto, and then encounters the Helots, who have been enslaved by the warlike Griffons, an allegory, as the editors point out in a useful note, of Charles I’s support for the Huguenots of La Rochelle in their struggle against the aggressive policies of Louis XIII and Cardinal Richelieu. Charles sent George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, but his expedition foundered when the citizens of the beleaguered city failed to provide him with proper support, which led to their eventual downfall. Knevet represents the Helots as unworthy of liberty, much as Milton was to represent the English over two decades later:                    

            Helots… a nation meanely bred,

            Envr’d to sordid labours, and excesse

            Of swinish gourmandise, and drunkenness,

            In warlike discipline small skill they had,

            Vnmeete they were for martial skirmishes,

            But fitter for the basket, and the spade,

            Then to defend themselues in field, with glistering blade.           

(9.9.32.2-9)

The Helots are unable to defend themselves as they lack the necessary discipline, and so are overwhelmed. Failure to control the body is directly linked to an inability to stand up for the nation and maintain the integrity of its borders. As usual one can see the Spenserian vocabulary in “swinish,” which is a reference to Grill wishing to stay under the spell of the Bower of Bliss, and “glistering,” used to describe military hardware throughout the Spenser canon. Where Knevet is most in sympathy with Spenser is as an anti-court poet, eager to remind readers that liberty is never easily won and that it cannot be defended properly by carpet knights, but requires “warlike discipline.”

This is a distinguished and seriously scholarly edition. Knevet is a poet who certainly warrants more attention than he has received over the years and, while he may never become a bestseller, it is important that he take his place among the pantheon of seventeenth-century poets. Drs. Burlinson and Zurcher have produced another fine edition to go alongside their splendid volume of Spenser’s letters (2009).[5] The volume would seem to be based on the format of the Longman Spenser, a large format book with nice wide margins enabling the owner of a copy to annotate and mark passages. The copious and valuable notes are included after the text (which can make for rather awkward reading, at times, but does leave a cleaner page). The editors are adept at explaining passages, providing the relevant historical and literary allusions, and explaining the intellectual context of the poem. The introduction is equally valuable and explains how the poem probably developed, why it might matter and how it can be read. At a time when there is ever more pressure on academics to speak to ever wider audiences, and for publishers to work within stringent business models, we need to be very grateful for all the expertise and labor that has gone into producing such a splendid work.

Andrew Hadfield
University of Sussex           

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